Silly me, we had a little bit of sun and I decided that it would…could….maybe…last for more than 2 whole days and booked myself in for a pedicure as to not scare innocent people with my wintery grey feet. I had a gift voucher for a treatment so I went on to the Nails Inc site to find a branch and booked myself in.

Oh I don’t know why I bother sometimes – oh wait I do, I had a gift voucher which means it wouldn’t cost me anything. And besides how bad can a pedicure be?

So there Terrific Tootisies Pedicure takes 45 minutes and the following things are done:

- Feet are soaked and hard and dry skin removed

- Feet are exfoliated and moisturised

- Cuticles soaked and trimmed

- Nails buffed and smoothed

- Nails painted with a colour of my choice.

So, I turn up for my appointment 8 minutes past (BLAME THE SLOW STAFF IN H&M) and someone else has already been seated before me. Can I come back in an hour? Mmm ok.

An hour later I get back and the girl who is supposed to do my pedicure is going home soon so someone else who I am guessing isn’t too sure is doing it because she’s having the procedure explained to her and it has been scribbled on a piece of paper. Ok.

Meanwhile the girls who are nice, are chatting away about rotas, long shifts, what did so and so say…I don’t know. I just find all of this chattering going on over me rather unprofessional. My iPhone battery has died so I am feeling a little anxious at this point as I’m wondering if I will be staring at a wall of polishes for 45 minutes.

However gal 1 heads off so it’s just me and gal 2 doing the pedicure. I ask her if she has been trained in..well, nails. Well, she was employed before she had even finished Level 2 in beauty, she explains. Mmmm ok.

So it begins with soaking…a lot of soaking is water which is getting colder and colder. I’ll just point out the things that weren’t actually done according to the list above;

- Hard skin was not removed (boo, that is a pedicure without some foot filing?)

- Nails weren’t buffed or smoothed

Apart from that everything else was done but there were a few real OUCH MY TOES moments such as;

- The violent see-sawing filing which seriously made me think I was saying sayonara to the ends of my toes. I flinched and pulled back but yeah….some passionate filing going on.

- CUTICLES. I hate cuticle work most of the time and once again, cream was applied and left on for 30 seconds then pushed and cut. OUCH. You know when your entire foot hurts when anything is applied to the cuticle area afterwards? That.

When all was said and done though, my feet were looking pretty good – I didn’t like having to put my feet on the floor though after the soaking (hello, another towel?) and really, I’d expect them to have disposable flip flop thingies so that I didn’t have to sit there for 20 minutes waiting for them to dry.

Then we got to paying, and I got my voucher out.

Sorry we don’t take vouchers. We sell them but we don’t take them.

Oh. But I mentioned it when booking.

I’ll call my manager.

A few minutes later…No we don’t take gift vouchers. Who did you speak to when booking?

Don’t remember. Ummm..well how much is it?

£48.

£48!!!?!?!?!?! See…I wouldn’t have booked in for a pedicure if it wasn’t for the gift voucher.

Well…ok this time we’ll take it but next time it’s chargeable.

Ooohhhhkayyyy then. Presumably the manager had given her some leeway as to whether to accept the voucher or not (and why not, someone else had spent £48 on it?) so why go through all that to make me feel uncomfortable? To see if I could be persuaded to pay first? Grrrr.

Well I stood my ground this time because I think for £48 for a pedicure is quite a lot of money and if I want someone to saw the end of my toe off, I can ask Mr C to file my toenails for me.

On standing up I smudged my big toe. When I kind of said OOPS and showed it to the gal, she looked at me with disdain, so I said, I’ll just top up the polish - which I duly did. I guess gift vouchers don’t make you feel very loved.

Verdict:

My feet look good, my toes are a bit sore and the cuticles definitely are though and I seriously would not ever pay £48 for a pedicure of that level.

Comments

They sell vouchers but don’t accept them??? So where CAN you spend your vouchers? Sounds pants! I have a couple of very close friends who are qualified and experienced beauticians and do a fab pedicure, so I’ve never been to one of these “chains” – and will remember not to any time soon!

I know imagine buying a voucher from them then they refuse to book you in? Apparently Debenhams accepts them but nots Nails Inc. Really the Nails Inc needs more details if certain places don’t accept vouchers. I realise now that a brand name doesn’t make it any better. The funny thing is she had a bright orange on her nails which I thought was really cool – when I asked her what colour it was she said she had her nails done at a local salon!!! I’m sorry but if I had a nail company I wouldn’t let me staff wear a random colour, they’d have to wear nails inc colours!

WTF! For that amount of money you should be treated like a goddess! D:< I am P.O.'d for you! I feel very lucky to frequent a place that treats me well and does have those disposable flip-flop thingies for about $25 per pedicure, even when I get stuck with the lady who is a little too aggressive at my cuticles (as you described hilariously).

From the way she was filing I knew the cuticle thing was going to be…a bit vicious. My toe is still aching today!!! It was funny cos I said to her, I have to put socks and boots on after the treatment so you know…how am I supposed to leave? She said it’ll dry quickly. ANYONE who has had a mani/pedi knows that it takes more like an hour for polish to truly dry!!!

This is so out of order! I would complain to Nails Inc, they charge a lot for what they do, my local nail bar is all singing and dancing for half that price! Have to say, the bigger the chain, the less they are inclined to deliver decent customer service!